Influence Without Time
by DemiwitchSlytherin
Summary: A young girl, age thirteen, was swept out of her universe and into the world of Ninjago. Nearly everything was the same as what she had seen in the TV shows, but there were two things that were different. People were, in fact, not made of lego, and there was a soon to be addition to the ninjas - Crystal Moon.
1. Chapter 1

**Hello fellow readers! This is my third story, and it has yet to be published. However, I hope you will enjoy what I have to give you!**


	2. Chapter 2

**I am sooooo sorry for the long wait! I am a bit busy lately, and I will try to update my next chapter sooner. Thanks for reading my fanfic.**

The cold, sharp wind hit her face as she calmly walked home from school. She hummed a happy tune with a fake smile plastered on her face, as she occasionally tuned in on the conversation that two of her friends were having.

Crystal Elizabeth Moon is what you would call an average popular girl who is living the dream life. She was beautiful, with her platinum blonde hair and soft, porcelain skin, and her eyes were a unique and mystic shade of sparkling silver, much like a pair of diamonds reflected in the moonlight. She had the best possible grades, top of her class in everything, even after skipping a grade. She was sporty, and is a part of both the school's tennis team as well as the dance group, and she has an implacable talent of singing.

Or at least, that's what it seems like to everyone else.

Crystal Moon had a secret. A terrible, terrible secret. It all started when her parents had divorced when she was only five years old. From then on, everything fell apart, and only worsened throughout the eight years that had passed.

It was small at first. Her parents would stay silent more often than not, and were very rarely seen in the same room as each other. However, they soon started having fights, arguing at every turn, the situation so rough that it seemed as if nature was at war with itself. A few days after her seventh birthday, her father left. He traveled away to another country, and just left Crystal with her mother. Her mother became distant, and no longer saw Crystal. She no longer saw the world for what it was. She became selfish and isolated, only caring for her own well being.

Crystal longed for her mother's attention, giving everything she had and more, just for the love and attention that other kids receive. It was why she got so smart and sporty in the first place. She studied harder than ever, mastering all her skills and even skipped a grade or two. She participated in sports, as well as learning six languages other than English; Spanish, Chinese, Japanese, French, Italian, German and Latin.

However, her efforts went to waste. There was nothing to help her either. She hated her beauty. It ridiculed her, causing jealousy amongst others that clouded their proper judgement of her. Those few people that did like her only did so to be at a higher status. In fact, her so called friends flocked her because of her beauty and intelligence, instead of her personality. This is the reason why she always wears a confident, smiling mask, whilst she was really dead inside.

Temporarily shaking away her negative thoughts, Crystal stopped at the cross section to wave goodbye to her two friends. "Goodbye, Kate, Belle. See you tomorrow!"

Kate gave her a sickly sweet smile in return. "See ya tomorrow, Chrissie! That is, if you don't die on the way to school tomorrow!" Sniggering, Kate and Belle turned away and walked down right path, occasionally sneaking glances at Crystal and snorting, until they disappeared from view.

Finally, Crystal turned to the left path and let her facial mask drop, as she trudged home slowly. Arriving at her house, she silently made her way up the stairs into her room. Locking the door, she collapsed on the bed, a lone tear sliding gown her cheek. Turning her head, she came face to face with a stuffed toy version of Kai from the ninjago TV show.

You might think, isn't Crystal a tad too old for toys now? Well, though she agreed, this was a different situation. When she was younger, she used to love the Ninjago shows, watching one or two episodes per day. She received this toy as a gift on her fifth birthday, exactly a week before her parents' divorce, before everything fell apart.

Hugging the stuffed toy tightly to her chest, she finally let her tears flow, down her face in a silent waterfall. Her thirteenth birthday was one week ago, and today was the exact same day that her parents had divorced. Why? It was a question she always asked herself. Why? Why did it all happen to her? Why her!

Her tears slowed to a stop, and her face hardened. She felt empty. Broken. Her last bit of hope was lost, as another year had past. She, for so long, had wanted her parent's love. Now… now she didn't know what she wanted. She was lost. Isolated.

"I… I give up!" She cried.

As the last bit of life she had in her left, she wilted, letting herself to be sucked into a strange different environment by some kind of force.

Opening her eyes, she took in the environment that she was now in, strangely calmly. It was as if she had lost the ability to hope, trust, and love. Observing her surroundings, she seemed to be in some kind of forest. The question was, what forest was it?

Pushing herself off the ground, she dusted herself off. Looking down at her school uniform, she decided that it wasn't good enough for this type of environment. It was a logical conclusion that she wasn't likely to find her way out of the forest too soon. There is little to no chance of someone in the forest, and the clothes she was wearing just weren't suited for this type of environment.

Digging into the backpack that she still had on her back from school, she took out her sports clothing, which consisted of a pair of white runners and black shorts, a silver tank top and a purple hooded jumper. She decided to keep her school books, just in case he needed something to keep her from dying of boredom, alone in the forest.

Digging into the ground for a piece of flint, she lit up a fire using some twigs and a piece of iron she had from science class, and chucked her school uniform into it. Watching it slowly burn away, she felt the weight of her old life burn away with it. Without any hesitation, she spun around and walked away, the smell of smoke slowly dying.

She didn't know how long she had been walking, whether it was for a couple hours or days. However, she knew one thing. She had eaten most of the extra food that she had packed into her backpack everyday before school, and there was only half a box of sultanas with an apple left. She knew that if she continued like this, she wouldn't last much longer.

Dropping her belongings on the ground – which wasn't much mind you, only a backpack along with its contents – she set up a small campfire. Picking up the large piece of iron she owned, she smelted it over the fire, before carefully separating it into three even pieces. Putting one one the pieces in her backpack, she used a rock to shape the iron into two small daggers, before sharpening the edges once it dried. This itself took a whole day, where she finished the last ratio of her food. Snapping a particularly thick twig in half, she used some tar from the tree to glue both pieces to the blades. Weighing the two daggers in her hand, she gave herself a satisfied nod.

Using some vine to make herself a belt, she carefully put the two daggers on the belt, before carefully removing them. She did this a few times, to get the hang of the feeling, before setting out to hunt. She walked silently, being careful not to step on any twigs, and listen for any noise. Suddenly, she heard a quite shuffle from the bushes nearby her, and made her way there slowly. Peeking in, she saw a large hare nibbling on a leaf. Positioning her dagger, she suddenly shot out at the hare, and stabbed it in the neck.

This was the end of the hare's long (or so she presumed) life. She made her way back to her campfire carrying the hare, removing the dagger from it's neck and wiping away the blood on some tree bark before it dried. Reaching the campfire, she let the hare bleed dry, before skinning it and cooking it above the fire.

That was the first real feast she had had in ages, the meat fresh and warm. Licking her lips, Crystal wrapped up the remaining uneaten half of the hare in leaves, before tying it up in vines. Storing the food away for emergencies, she continued on with her hike to who knows where.

Her next few weeks were spent like this, hunting for food each day, occasionally finding berries whist others finding nothing. Those days were the reason she always stored away the extra food instead of throwing it away.

Her skills with a dagger improved, and she also got better at sneaking up on animals. However, she soon felt that the dagger was too inefficient, no matter how good she was at hunting. She never was fast and silent enough to hunt larger animals, such as a doe, which she had crossed twice so far. So, to solve her problem, she crafted herself a bow, made out of wood from a dead sapling. The string of the bow was made of vines, and the few arrows she had made so far were made of twigs, with sharp stones glued on the tip using the tar from a tree.

She was currently learning how to aim, using the blood from the animals to make a target board on the trees. She was improving, and she now rarely ever shoots and arrow out of the first or second ring. She knew that she wasn't going to be using the bow until she learnt how to shoot in the dead centre every time, and she was going to achieve it, no matter how long it takes. Though, it shouldn't take too long, as she is a fast learner and tends to learn things twice as fast as others, whilst using half of their effort. Combine that with her determination, and you get an unstoppable weapon in itself.

This was her life for a few months, the same cycle over and over, never anything new (apart from her new mastery with a bow). This life ended, however, when she arrived at a city. The city was positioned right next to the forest, so she didn't realise that she was out of the forest until she bumped into a man walking around.

Her body froze, and it stayed like that for ages, her mind unable to comprehend the fact that she was actually out of the forest. Not only that, but she had arrived in a village filled with people, from what she could see so far. There were some selling goods, and others buying them. There were some just walking around as a large, happy family. She stiffened, finally breaking free of the shock. Family. The word echoed endlessly in her mind, tormenting her. Family. Something she never had. Shaking away the feelings of jealousy and self pity, she concentrated on survival.

Moving to a more scarcely populated area of the village and into a dark alleyway, she let out a shaky sigh. Racking her brain for ways to survive in her current situation, she came up with only one. And it was not one that she liked.

Knowing that she didn't have shelter or the money to buy food, she concluded that there was no other choice but to continue to camp and hunt for food in the forest. However, the news wasn't all bad. Now that she was in a village, she could camp as closely as possible to the city as possible without being seen, and she could also look for a small and temporary job whilst she was at it.

She received an easy job at a daycare centre, where she had to look after kids from the age three to twelve. She scoffed inwardly. She couldn't believe that there were kids as old as twelve that still needed babysitting. Just look at her! She could also hardly believe the fact that she had to lie about being a short sixteen year old to get the job. The people hiring her looked uncertain about her age, but they couldn't just outright refuse her. They decided to let her work for one day and probably wanted to kick her out later whilst saying that "the kids didn't like her" or something. However, they couldn't do it, as all of the kids simply loved her and said that she was the most understanding babysitter in the world.

It honestly didn't take her long to save up enough money for a tent and sleeping bag, along with the other life necessaries such as a toothbrush. Since the kids from daycare liked her, they told their parents about it. Since their parents were happy that their kids were happy, they gave the daycare centre a good rating, adding in a comment every now and then about the fact that their "kids really enjoyed the new person you had hired to look after them, and to make sure to up their payment". Since the people running the centre couldn't exactly say no to that, they had upped Crystal's payment by ten percent each week, and it was roughly double the payment of everyone else's by now.

So in conclusion, Crystal has been living the average and normal life for a while now. But of course that had to come to an end. She had been minding her own business one day, looking around at the different shops with curiosity, when someone ran into her. Literally. Holding her arms out to regain her balance, Crystal bit her lip to stop herself from crying out in alarm.

"I am so sorry!" Cried the postman – from what his clothes looked like, she assumed he was one – frantically. Straightening his hat – which had gone crooked from when he rammed into her – he cleared his throat. "Crystal Elizabeth Moon?" He asked warily. Crystal nodded. The postman quickly shuffled through his bag, before taking out an envelope and handing it to her. "Here." Without waiting for her response, the postman took off, presumedly to find the next person that he had to deliver to.

Face pale with shock, Crystal tucked away the letter into her jumper before discreetly slipping away from the village and back to her campsite. She made sure that she was alone before opening and reading the letter.

 _Dear Crystal Moon,_

 _You are hereby invited to become a participant in the Tournament of Elements. There you will compete and fight against other champions in order to be recognised as the greatest elemental master in all of Ninjago._

 _If you are willing to participate, please meet up at the docks at the edge of Ninjago City. Make sure to not be late, as the boat leaves at 11AM sharp. All weapons are not allowed, and must be left behind as part of the rules._

 _May the odds be in your favour,_

 _Clouse,_

 _Apprentice of Master Chen_

Crystal's eyes had widened with every word she read, before the paper finally slipped out of her hand and gently fluttered to the ground. She blinked once, twice, _three times,_ yet the paper did not disappear. It shouldn't be possible. It should not be possible. Shaking her head, she let out an uncertain laugh. Of course it wasn't possible, it was stupid of her to think it was in the first place. Dismissing the letter as a prank, she carried on with her day.

In order to ease her nerves, she ventured off into a more populated, fun area of the city. She spent the day relaxing, eating at fancy restaurants, watching the newest movies. Yet, she couldn't shake away the part of her mind that had a feeling that the letter was indeed telling the truth. She soon blocked out the thought, however, determined that logic was the way to go. And so, she continued on with her day.

On the way home, she decided that the normal route home would take too long, and since it was already dark out, no one would notice anything if she went for a shorter route. However, it seemed that luck definitely wasn't on her side today, as she stumbled over a trapdoor on the ground, covered in moss and dirt.

Whilst knowing that it was not a good idea to see what was beyond the trapdoor, that could quite possibly get her killed, she also couldn't help but wonder what was beyond it. In the end, her curiosity won over her sense of caution, and she carefully opened the trapdoor and ventured down into the world of unknown.

…

It turned out, it was as much of a 'world' as it was 'unknown'. There were very few steps, and they only seemed to be any there in the first place to make sure that the room was underground. The roof of it was probably only half a metre from the surface.

As for the room, it was small and empty, the rough, stone walls lit up by dim torches. However, there was one thing in the room that took her breath away. In the centre of the room was a small alter, and upon the alter was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen in the entire universe. _Ever._

Gently resting on the alter was an elegantly carved bow, seemingly made out of pure, solid silver, including the bowstring. Lying beside it were two equally beautifully carved daggers, also made with silver, only with the excess black leather handles.

She gently picked up the weapons, and they seemed to melt into her touch, humming warmly. They seemed to have been made for her, waiting for her to approach them, as they knew she would. Crystal let a small smile grace her face, but jumped slightly in alarm when the bow and daggers started to shrink in her grip.

Her face formed into a look of childish wonder when the the weapons stopped shrinking, having transformed into a a silver headband and a pair of silver bracelets. Smiling, she put on the accessories and made her way out of the secret underground place, as she liked to call it. She happily hummed herself a tune, wondering why such wonderful magic chose her to be the weilder, when a stab of horrible realisation hit her, a bit too close to home.

Magic. The jewellery weapons definitely had magic for it to work. However, there was no magic on Earth. Magic simply didn't exist there. This couldn't be real. Unless she was in an entirely different universe…

Her mind immediately traveled back to this morning, back to the letter she received. Her face paled drastically. No. No, it couldn't be! There was no way that she was in Ninjago, and there was definitely no way that she was an elemental master. Her eyes traveled from the docks in the distant to her purple wristwatch. 10:45AM. She gulped. There was only one way to find out.


	3. Chapter 3

Crystal, being the early bird she was, arrived at the docks 10 minutes early, only to realise that everybody was already there. Well, not everyone. The ninja weren't there, but that's to be expected. Using this extra time to study everyone, she immediately noticed two major objectives, that may or may not be problematic in the future.

One, every single person on the boat was older than her, the youngest on the boat – other than her – looked around 15 or 16, and the oldest looked about 20. Also, if she remembered correctly, the ninjas were all older than her as well, Jay was 15, Kai was 17, Cole was 19 and Zane was 18. Lloyd… Crystal wasn't sure about him. If you counted the years that he has been living, then he would be 13 as well, a month or two older than her. However, if this is after he was forced to suddenly enlarged by Tomorrow's Tea, then she would guess that he was around 18 or 19.

Another thing that could possibly put her at a disadvantage is the fact that they are all wearing fancy armoured costumes, which in her opinion, looked wayyyyy out of fashion. However, it wasn't the fashion that counted. The fact that their clothing had protections and stuff, it meant that it would be harder to battle against them. All Crystal wore was her trademark white sneakers, black leggings, a silver tank top and a purple sweater.

But, an advantage that she had was her weapons. She bet that none of the others had any weapons they could sneak in with, seeing as it was likely that their weapons do not magically transform into accessories. Oh, and she also had her watch.

The ninja chose that moment to arrive, whispering to Garmadon, presumedly about the tournament. Crystal took one glance at them before sighing internally. She couldn't believe that she didn't see this sooner! Not even having a little suspicion about ninjago being real whilst all the facts were laced out in front of her.

Flinching, she thought back to her past few weeks, shifting through every memory that had clues of her being in ninjago.

First, there was the fact that the village she had resided in was called Jamanakai, and there were the occasional conversations between villagers that were either about the ninja or Garmadon which she dismissed as mishearing. She supposed that she knew about it for a while, subconsciously, but her conscious mind had been too afraid to acknowledge that fact.

She made her way onto the ship, making sure to stay in the shadows as to not be seen. It would be best to keep a low profile for now, as she didn't need unwanted attention. It was best best to be but off by others as useless or unimportant. Not threatening in their rise to fame. Having others underestimate her would give her the element of surprise later on. **(HA! Get it?** _ **Element**_ **of surprise? "ELEMENT"? Hehe, sorry for the pun. Couldn't resist.)**

Giving a one shot at observing her surroundings, she sprinted forwards when nobody was looking. Using her momentum, she lunged, flinging herself off the ground and latching herself onto the flagpole, gripping tightly. Quickly, yet firmly, she climbed up, before hauling herself up onto a platform that she had located from the ground. Letting a small smirk grace her lips, she cherished the fact that it was impossible for anyone to see her, whist she could observe anyone she wanted. She spent the rest of the ride up there.

When the boat glided to a stop, Crystal waited for the other champions to leave the ship, before agilely leaping off the platform in a front flip, landing on a signpost and sliding down. Landing softly on her toes, she brushed off the non-existent dirt on her front, finally grateful for all the years of dance and gymnastics she had. She never knew that grace and flexibility would help her in life threatening situations.

Quietly slipping into the large building, she silently followed the other champions. Taking a seat at the very end of the table filled to the brim with food, Crystal sat up straight with her hands in her lap, carefully molding her expression to become a polite, sweet smile.

Some of the champions noticed her now that she wasn't hiding, but most dismissed her as a incompetent child, or at least something similar. Oh well. Better for her. She was brought out of her thoughts when a loud, obnoxious voice filled the room.

"Welcome to the Tournament of Elements! Now all of you will DIE – " Chen paused dramatically, gasps of shock and horror reflecting around the room, whilst Crystal barely managed to stop herself from rolling her eyes. " – rect your attention to me!

"Never had so many elemental fighters been under one roof! I see master of shadow, speed, and even a prophesied, green saviour." His voice was high with excitement, probably thinking of the fact that he would soon have all of our elemental powers, and become unbeatable.

Wait.

Crystal paused. _What was my elemental power, again? I didn't really know about it until I got the letter._ Blinking, she stored that question away for later, turning her attention to Chen for now, who had just turned to Garmadon. "And a former pupil has returned…" Chen mused, causing Crystal to tense slightly, before quickly relaxing herself.

Then he turned around, and finally directed our attention to something other than himself; his gong. Though, that wasn't much better, Crystal thought with distain.

"The symbol before you is the Anacondrai, the fiercest, most powerful serpentine warriors to ever roam this land. It's motto… only one can remain!"

A servant of his walked up, and loudly banged the gong. This seemed to activate something, as the tournament matches popped out. I noticed that I was going against Karloff, master of metal. However, it was likely that he would be the first to fail, like in the TV show, and then I would be facing… Shade. I would be facing Shade.

Internally cursing, I prepared for my incoming doom. There was no way that I would win against him. He can blend into the shadows, for gods sake! And what can I do? Pretend to be pretty and innocent and hope he lets me win?

Pursing my lips, I calmed myself down. I would be able to use my element. I would just have to find out what it was, first. I would be fine. And even if I don't figure it out, he would tell me about what it is during my fight, right?

Chen interrupted my inner turmoil. "Behold, a jade blade!" He said, dramatically lifting one up in the air. "Here it represents life, obtain it and move on. Allow your opponent to take it… LOSER! The rules are simple, every match would be different, no two fights will be the same. Use it or lose it!"

Karloff butted in on the one sided conversation. "What does Karloff win?"

Chen smirked. "Win… and stay on the island. Win it all, and receive fortunes beyond your wild test dreams, as well as a lifetime supply of Master Chen Noodles!" Crystal almost blanched. "But, no one is here for the noodles, you want the glory of being the best fighter in all of Ninjago!"

A loud cheer erupted through the crowd, and Crystal reluctantly joined in, if only to keep her cover. She spotted the ninja using her peripheral vision, and not even one of them were cheering. In fact, they seemed to be on the edge of blowing up in anger, with everything about Zane. Crystal felt a touch of sympathy for them, but it was gone before she could recognise it.

Finally, Garmadon stepped up. "And what happens if you lose?" He questioned.

Chen looked at him with fake confusion on his face, which was ruined by his large smirk. "Lose? Who here likes to lose!" Another round of laughter echoed around the room, and Crystal was once again forced to join in.

"Now, please enjoy my island. It's a super fun, happy place!" Chen sang, "Fun time on me!" He said, before rushing off to do who knows what.

Clouse, seeing his master's dismissal, took charge of the situation. "Please lead the elemental to their respective rooms." He droned in a monotone voice, filled with the slightest of distaste.

The kabuki came and one of them lead Crystal to a room, opening the grand door. "Your room, Miss Moon." She stated, before walking away.

Crystal observed her room with barely contained amazement. The roof was black with stars, and reflected the night sky. The walls were a deep amethyst, and the floor was covered in a white carpet. The bed, along with the other furniture, were made of silver, as well as the single moon on the roof. Sighing in contempt, Crystal collapsed on her bed, the soft, purple bedsheets brushing against her skin.

Maybe being here won't be so bad. This single room was about ten times larger than the tent she owned, and the bed was the softest she had ever laid on. She dearly wanted to go to sleep, but she knew that in an hour or so there would be the search for fang blades. Sitting up, Crystal grabbed a random book from the bookshelf next to her bed, before looking at the title.

"Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets."

Her eyes widened in delight. She hadn't read a fantasy novel in sooo long! Opening to the first page, she allowed herself to become immersed in the story. **(Warning! Spoiler alert.)** Her surroundings seemed to fade away as she became one with the story, imagining the dusted wall, chicken blood painted on it, the sounds of kids screaming in fear, whilst Dumbledore came to the rescue, declaring that Ms Norris was in fact not dead. **(Spoiler over.)**

Her wonderful break from reality was broken as Chen's annoying voice sounded throughout the building.

"Hello? HELLO! The microphone is working, yes?"

Somewhere in the background, you could hear Clouse's annoyed reply. "Yes, master. The microphone is on."

"Oh goody! *hem hem* Hidden around my island are several jade blade. There is enough for everyone, apart from one. The one who returns to the palace arena empty handed loses! The tournament begins… NOW!" Chen explained in excitement.

Biting back a groan, Crystal gently folded the corner of the page she was reading, before gently putting it down. She really didn't like doing so, and she thought of it as a violation to the books, but there was no other option right now. She didn't expect Chen to be considerate enough to get her bookmarks.

She rushed outside, only to come face to face with a lot of commotion. Having spotted a jade blade in the corner of her eyes, she slowly backed up in that direction, widening her eyes in terror. Coming to a stop, she grasped the jade blade from behind her back, before sprinting in the arena with the jade blade tucked in her sweater, hidden from the sights of other contestants.

Slipping the blade in one of the holders, she let herself relax, creeping into the dark corner to observe the other contestants.

As she expected, as soon as Karloff came into the room, Kai came zooming from behind and snatched the jade blade out of his hand, winning it for himself. Crystal sighed with disappointment. That was a very unfair thing that Kai had did, and it wasn't right.

She watched with sad eyes as Karloff was cast out of the tournament, where he would soon have his powers stolen from him, as well as being forced to work in the noodle factory.

After they were dismissed, Crystal swiftly trudged back to her room, and rested on her bed, hoping to sleep. It didn't work, as images of Karloff losing his powers trickled into her mind, which was soon followed by other elementals. Sighing, she opened her book, and resumed from where she left off.

After all, it was the only distraction she had at the moment.


End file.
